New satellite analysis reveals massive damage US military sites suffered from airstrikes

[paleotn]

12. It's called DCAA - Defense Contract Audit Agency.

They actually do a good job keeping things above board. There is waste here and there, but not as extensive as the common meme, with DCAA in folks "financial shorts" routinely.

Here's the real problem / situation. Much of it due to the nature of defense spending...

- DoD programs are sometimes a make work project for congress critters and their states / districts. They routinely keep alive programs and platforms DoD doesn't even want. End of the day, it's congress critters in charge of how much DoD spends and on what.

- You can't buy system components just off the shelf from anywhere. Unless there's no other choice, the entire supply chain is within the US, with US labor rates. No outsourcing to China or Vietnam for obvious reasons.

- Production runs are generally small, thus costly vs. production at scale, cranking out bazillions of widgets.

- Materials / components are short runs, many times made from materials the commercial world doesn't use due to cost and availability. - read overkill.

- Which leads into quality. If your dishwasher goes on the blink, it's an annoying inconvenience. If military platforms don't do what they're supposed to do, every time, people die. Melodramatic, yes, but that's what would happen if the military took Walmart bombshell quality into battle.

- Lastly, compare the average defense contractors profit margins to Apple, Moderna, Broadcom, Nvidia, etc. You'd be surprised who really has their hand in your pocket.